Term paper on The Legalization of Medical Marijuana should it be allowed?

In actuality, marijuana is a drug which is legally banned. However, today, marijuana can be used for medical purposes in the treatment of patients. Therefore, the legalization of medical marijuana becomes an important issue. However, the problem of the legalization of medical marijuana is a persistent problem because the legalization of medical marijuana may have both positive and negative effects.

The legalization of medical marijuana will provide health care services to patients with such health problems, such as Alzheimer disease and other health problems. The use of medical marijuana may be helpful in treatment of many serious conditions in patients. Health care professionals (Nestler and Malenka, 81) insist that the legalization of medical marijuana is essential for the improvement of the quality of health care services and treatment of patients.

The legalization of medical marijuana can prevent patients and health care professionals using medical marijuana from legal liability. Today, marijuana, including medical marijuana is illegal. Therefore, health care professionals cannot use medical marijuana in their practice. Otherwise, they become liable to the legal prosecution for the use of medical marijuana. The legalization of medical marijuana will tackle this problem and health care professionals will have the legal ground for using medical marijuana for the treatment of patients. Some researchers (Mcdonough, 53) point out that medical marijuana can have a positive impact on the treatment of patients with serious health problems.

On the other hand, the legalization of medical marijuana raises a bunch of problems. For instance, the availability of medical marijuana after legalization raises the problem of misuse of marijuana and aggravation of the problem of drug addiction. Medical marijuana may be used as a drug because law enforcement agencies cannot always control the use medical marijuana. The risk of misuse of medical marijuana is high and law enforcement agencies oppose to the legalization of medical marijuana (Wolf, 150).

The legalization of medical marijuana raises the problem of the control over the spread of marijuana and its cultivation. The legalization of medical marijuana can lead to using medical marijuana as a pretext for the cultivation of marijuana, while marijuana may be used as drug sold to drug addicts. Law enforcement agencies may face difficulties with the prosecution of individuals growing medical marijuana as well as health care professionals, who misuse medical marijuana.

In addition, the legalization of medical marijuana may provoke a considerable rise of drug addiction because the number of drug addicts will increase after the legalization of medical marijuana. Medical marijuana may become available to drug addicts. Drug addicts may get access to medical marijuana and receive prescription of medical marijuana from health care professionals.

Finally, there is always a risk of overdose or the excessive use of medical marijuana by patients in the course of the treatment of their health problem. For instance, patients can use more medical marijuana than their doctor recommends. Moreover, in a long-run perspective, patients using medical marijuana may develop drug addiction. They can slip from medical marijuana to illegal marijuana and other drugs.

Thus, taking into account all above mentioned, it is important to place emphasis on the fact that the legalization of medical marijuana raises both arguments for and against the legalization. The legalization of medical marijuana can bring positive effects for the treatment of patients, who need marijuana as medication. On the other hand, the legalization of medical marijuana can increase drug addiction.